The critical urban talk series is organised around a survey and practical design of urban development. In particular, the talks will question the existing status quo of urban planning and critically address various issues related to urban transformation in Chennai and India in applied and innovative ways.

The first critical urban talk 'Our Water' addresses questions on providing access to clean water to everyone, implementing waste water systems and teaching intelligent use of water. Thus, it shows examples of interventions within the city and city spheres from the larger perspective of urban infrastructure to a people-oriented perspective. The striking questions will be: What is an Indian city? What makes it the people's city?

The format Critical Urban Talk has a time slot of 75 minutes for each session to highlight title, theses, facts and questions. The talk will start by a thematic input of 10 minutes and 3 crucial questions.

Julian Petrin, Nexthamburg, Hamburg; Karin Sandeck, Bayerische Oberstn Baubehörde (Chief Building Authorities of Bavaria), Munich; and Dieter Läpple, Hafen University, Hamburg will participate in the panel discussions. A detailed programme will be available at the Urban Mela from August 24th onwards.

The second critical urban talk 'Our Waste' discusses the increasing problems of waste and missing recycling cycles. It addresses both questions of individual behaviour and implementing of clean solutions.

The third critical urban talk 'Our City' challenges the question of the 'political economy': the multiple networks of relationships between people, space and wealth. The underlying question that arises is the relation between informal and formal processes, between global and local scales and the change of private and public spaces.

Talking about cities ought to mean talking about people. But how can we include bottom-up approaches and the perspective of the inhabitants into city planning and urban development? What do we understand, if we talk about participation? How is participation linked to responsibility? What urban intervention is possible? The workshop will present background, ideas and examples and discuss the necessary role of people within urban development.